Vistas On The James

[burt]

You need to make a reservation with VR...Space is limited to 75.

[Cadeho]

Why do they schedule stuff on odd days and odd hours? Weekends too much to ask for?

[Cadeho]

[TBurban]

Awesome!! Thanks, Cam.

[wrldcoupe4]

First shot was a great vantage point... was it near the skywalk to the Monroe tower?>

[burt]

Wow! They are great pix. The 1st one of 14th street and Vistas rising is superb!

For one fleeting second I thought Pix #3 and #4 were one shot and that Vistas had grown all of a sudden.

While I was in Norfolk I bought Patricia's Cornwell's hard cover book titled "Trace" at MacArthur Center. The book store had it on sale for $5.99, and since almost all of her mystery/forensic novels are set in Richmond, I bought it. I just started reading it last night and the first chapter deals with strange goings-on at the demolition site of the old State Forensic Laboratory which was replaced by the new garage in Cam's Picture #1.

The new State Forensic Lab is Biotech 2, and lots of the subsequent action in the book takes place there.

[burt]

Here ya go.

Pretty neat to see the cars 'scoot' along.

[Henry]

Anybody go on the Venture Richmond tour of Vistas and Lady Bird this morning?

[burt]

Anybody go on the Venture Richmond tour of Vistas and Lady Bird this morning?

[JSI]

Didn't you go Henry? I was hoping we'd get a report. JSI said he might make it and I would think Downtown Dave would have put it high on his list.

[urbanvb]

Thanks for the update, JSI.

[jbjust]

Doesn't sound like the mayor's unit will have a particularly good view of the river.

[burt]

Doesn't sound like the mayor's unit will have a particularly good view of the river.

[CommRE]

I also went on both tours this morning. Margaret Freund took groups through the Lady Byrd. Toad's Place will open in the spring, but they have a lot of work to do yet. We started on the street level floor where there is about 7,000 sf available on the south side for one or two restaurants. She indicated interest has picked up as Vistas comes along.

The other half of the building is Toad's Place, and they are on the lower level as well. The floor will be cut out so patrons can see the stage that will be on the lower level. The top floor was cool. There is already a tenant in there, Roseline, and she said they have a contract out on the rest of the space. It is funky office space, as you would expect. She gave a lot of neat info on the history of the building - such as steel supports had to be put in all around the exterior of the builiding because the original wood pilings had long ago rotted. One of the main delays was the relocation of the sewer (17 ft deep) from beside the building on Virginia St to under Virginia St.

Toad's Place will also have a restaurant on the lower level beside the music venue. You will be able to access Toad's Place from the Canal.

That's all that comes to mind right now. Sorry, no pics.

[burt]

Great report, CommRe. Did Ms Freund say anything about a hydrolic stage which will rise from the ground level of Toads thru the cut-out to the second level?

[wrldcoupe4]

Thanks for the info on both projects! shame I couldn't go.

[JSI]

Pics as promised...

Like I said it was very foggy

All pictures are from the 12th of 18 floors

The Mayor's Pad

Interior Finishes

Getting ready to upload some Toad's Pictures

[TBurban]

Those are amazing! I love the pictures of the fog covering the lower buildings. That one shot of the majority of the skyline really shows how much vacant space we need to develop. Thanks for the tour!!

[burt]

Great pix, JSI. I hope there will be a commentary with your Lady Bird shots

[Shakman]

I spoke with the the Project Superintendent who indicated that topping out will be this coming Tuesday. The tower crane will come down in about a month after topping out.

[TBurban]

Nice shot of Vistas in the paper....

(sorry about the quality, needed to brush the dust off the ole' scanner)

[burt]

Here ya go.

Pretty neat to see the cars 'scoot' along.

[burt]

The web cam is very busy at the moment, but here are a couple of observation from a minute ago:

The James seems to be running pretty high.

Lots of trucks parked to the left of Lady Bird in the cam shot. I hope this means work is going apace on Toads.

I wonder if anything is happening to Mayo's Island. It looks pretty forlorn out there in the middle of the river. I don't believe it has any sewerage connection to city lines.

When a building is topped out, don't construction workers traditionally put a cut tree at the topmost point? Seems to me they're still working on the final level.

[Downtowner]

Didn't I hear something about the Tower Crane going down? Looks like to me it would be down by now.

[TBurban]

That tree should be going up any day now...